🔗 Share this article

The US President is not typically known for guidance, particularly from international figures who often seek to praise and compliment the US president.

But, El Salvador's strongman president Nayib Bukele has followed a different strategy by calling on the White House to emulate his actions in impeaching so-called “dishonest judges.”

The call for the president to take action against the American court system also received backing from Trump allies, such as an social media message by one-time supporter the billionaire, who has previously amplified Bukele's demands to impeach US judges.

Unprecedented Risks to Court Autonomy

Experts say that Bukele's recent remarks come at a time of unprecedented threats to court autonomy and specific justices in the United States, and during a phase where the Trump administration is using comparable strong-arm tactics used by leaders in nations such as Turkey, Hungary, India, and his native El Salvador to weaken government oversight.

Bukele's online statement recently was one more in a string of provocations and claims he has made against the American judiciary, such as a spring assertion that the US was “facing a court takeover,” and his mockery of a federal judge's ruling to stop removal operations transporting accused illegal immigrants to his nation's brutal prison system.

Attacks on Oregon Justice

Bukele's impeachment call was also issued during online attacks on the state's federal judge Judge Immergut by White House aide Stephen Miller, former AG Pam Bondi, Elon Musk, and Trump personally in a latest press gaggle.

The judge had issued injunctions blocking the administration from mobilizing the national guard, initially in the state then in the West Coast state. The president has been eager to send soldiers into the city, which the leader has described as “battle-scarred” based on limited, non-violent protests outside the urban homeland security facility.

History of Targeting Judges

The advisor, the former AG, and the entrepreneur have a long record of attacking judges who have blocked presidential directives or in other ways impeded the government's political agenda. Prior to resuming office this year, the president directed his followers against judges presiding over his civil and criminal trials, who were then deluged with intimidation and harassment.

Monitoring groups, police departments, and judges themselves have highlighted a increased climate of risks and intimidation in the months since he re-entered the White House.

Increasing Threat Statistics

Based on data collected by the federal agency, in 2025 through the end of September, there were over five hundred threats to 395 US justices, leading to 805 inquiries. This year has already surpassed 2022, and 2024, and is on track to exceed the previous year's record of over six hundred reported incidents.

The threats are not just happening at the federal level. Information by the university's Bridging Divides Initiative indicates that there have been at least 59 instances of threats, harassment, surveillance, or physical attacks committed against judges on the state and municipal levels in the current year.

Analyst Analysis on Root Causes

Specialists state that the intimidation are a result of the rhetoric coming from senior administration figures.

In spring, the Global Project Against Hate and Extremism (GPAHE) published a detailed report claiming that “malicious and highly irresponsible statements from Trump administration members and allies align with rising aggressive posts on social media.” It noted “a 54% rise in demands for impeachment and violent threats against judges across social media platforms from January to February 2025, the first full month of the president's term.”

Heidi Beirich, the founder of the organization, said: “The president's warnings against judges have definitely fueled digital abuse at judges and calls for impeachment. Attacking the judiciary is another move in the administration's march towards strongman rule.”

International Authoritarian Playbook

That march towards authoritarianism has been well-trodden in the past decade in multiple countries, such as by the Salvadoran.

In 2021, immediately after commencing a new term in the face of constitutional prohibitions, Bukele’s allies in congress voted to remove the country’s top prosecutor and several judges on the constitutional court. The justices, who had angered him by ruling against pandemic policies, made way for replacements hand picked by Bukele.

The move echoed the Hungarian leader's overhaul of Hungary’s court system several years back; Recep Tayyip Erdoğan’s court cleanups recently; and efforts at similar moves in the Middle Eastern state and Poland.

Undermining Court Autonomy

Experts say that the threats and verbal assaults in the US can be seen as efforts to undermine judicial independence in a structure that offers no easy way for the executive to dismiss judges the administration opposes.

Leonard, an academic at Illinois State University who has researched democratic decline in democracies, said the White House had taken cues from the models set by strongmen abroad.

“The government is looking around at these achievements and failures. They know they’re not going to be able to pass any laws that would undermine the courts,” she said.

Citing examples such as Miller’s relentless claims of nearly limitless executive power, she noted: “They openly attack the courts by repeating over and over that it is not a co-equal branch in the government structure.

“They continue to reframe the debate by emphasizing their argument that the executive has more power than this judicial branch, which is not how checks and balances work.”

Leonard said: “Judges' sole safeguard is public trust in the authority of their capacity to make those rulings. Personal intimidation on top of eroding institutional legitimacy may make judges think twice about judgments that go against the sitting government, which is, of course, highly concerning for judicial review and for the political system.”

Coercion Methods

Kim Lane Scheppele, professor of sociology and international affairs at Princeton University, has documented the use of “autocratic legalism” by the likes of Orbán and Putin, and has warned about rising dangers to judges in the US.

She pointed to a wave of termed “pizza doxxings” recently, in which judges have received unwanted food orders with the customer listed as Daniel Anderl, the child of Justice Salas, who was murdered at the residence in 2020 by a gunman aiming at Salas.

“All understands what it means. ‘Your address is known. We’re coming for you,’” Scheppele said.

“US justices are protected by the presidential protection and the federal police. And those are both dedicated police units that are placed structurally inside the Department of Justice. And Pam Bondi has been spearheading the attacks on justices.”

Government Goals

Regarding the administration’s aims, Scheppele said that “removing a US justice is almost certainly not going to happen because it’s so hard to do. {Right now|Currently